Experiment Management for the Problem Solving Environment WBCSim

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Abstract

A problem solving environment (PSE) is a computational system that provides
a complete and convenient set of high level tools for solving problems
from a specific domain. This thesis takes an in-depth look at the experiment
management aspect of PSEs, which can be divided into three levels: 1) data
management, 2) change management, and 3) execution management. At the data
management level, anything related to an experiment (computer simulation)
should be stored and documented. A database management system can be used
to store the simulation runs for a PSE. Then various high level interfaces
can be provided to allow users to save, retrieve, search, and compare these
simulation runs. At the change management level, a scientist should only
focus on how to solve a problem in the experiment domain. Aside from
running experiments, a scientist may only consider how to define a new
model, how to modify an existing model, and how to interpret an experiment
result. By using XML to describe a simulation model and unify various
implementation layers, changing an existing model in a PSE can be intuitive
and fast. At the execution management level, how an experiment is executed
is the main concern. By providing a computational steering capability, a
scientist can pause, examine, and compare the intermediate results from a
simulation. Contrasted with the traditional way of running a lengthy
simulation to see the result at the end, computational steering can leverage
the user's expert knowledge on the fly (during the simulation run) and
provide new insights and new product design opportunities. This thesis
illustrates these concepts and implementation by using WBCSim as an example.
WBCSim is a PSE that increases the productivity of wood scientists conducting
research on wood-based composite materials and manufacturing processes.
It integrates Fortran 90 simulation codes with a Web based graphical front
end, an optimization tool, and various visualization tools. The WBCSim
project was begun in 1997 with support from United States Department of
Agriculture, Department of Energy, and Virginia Tech. It has since been
used by students in several wood science classes, by graduate students and
faculty, and by researchers at several forest products companies. WBCSim
also serves as a test bed for the design, construction, and evaluation of
useful, production quality PSEs.